A short transcript excerpt from a YouTube video in which Srikumar Rao argues that the belief in personal control is an illusion and that acceptance of uncertainty—rather than resisting it—reduces suffering. He advises anchoring oneself in stability by monitoring and managing 'mental chatter' and not being driven by fear or panic, especially during COVID-19-related upheaval.
Chapters
Your mental chatter is fake news. One of the strongest illusions we have is that we have control. In my program, I talk about, you do not have control, you never had control, you never will have control. And persons thought, they're ready to think they've understood it. And they might have understood it on an intellectual level, but they haven't, deep down. Because when I say you don't have control, I mean you don't have control over anything. You don't have control about whether or not you're going to take your next breath. And people say, well, look, you know, of course I have control. If I want to scratch my nose, I can scratch my nose. And here it is, I do it again and I can do it wherever I can by will. As someone pointed out, yes, you can do it until one day you can't. So in a very real sense, what is happening is that we in the developed world are now facing the things that we knew and accepted as the bedrock of civilization, as things will always be there, also uncertain, and we don't have control. And that is scaring us. I would simply advocate accepting that because all of our suffering comes from resisting what is. And I'm suggesting that we stop resisting what it is and recognize, yes, it is. Things could happen. You could lose your jobs, your savings could be devastated. Don't waste your time agonizing about it. Don't waste your time worrying about it. It's very easy to say don't worry about it, but when it's your 401k that's getting hammered and you're the person who is likely to lose your job tomorrow. But nevertheless, that's the rock bottom truth. It is your job to anchor yourself in stability. And the only way that you're going to pull this off is to be ruthless in monitoring your mental chatter. Don't be driven by fear, don't be driven by panic.
